The recent Epsilon Press Release letting their clients know that a major security breach had occurred at their company has email security companies like MxToolBox on the alert. Epsilon is one of the largest distributor of permission-based emails in the world and that equates to around 40 billion marketing emails per year. They have revealed that millions of individual email addresses were exposed during the attack and breach of their servers. Among Epsilon’s customers are US Bank, JPMorgan Chase, TiVo, Capital One, the Home Shopping Network, LL Bean Visa Card, Ritz-Carlton Rewards, Best Buy, Disney Destinations, Walgreens, and many more. (net-security.org)

You may ask what exactly is phishing and why is it so dangerous? Phishing is a way of attempting to acquire sensitive information such as user names, passwords and credit card details by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication. Communications purporting to be from popular social web sites, auction sites, online payment processors or IT administrators are commonly used to lure the unsuspecting public. Phishing is typically carried out by e-mail or instant messaging, and it often directs users to enter details at a fake website whose look and feel are almost identical to the legitimate one (wikipedia.org).

Additional Resources
Original Epsilon Press Release regarding incident.
Epsilon Breach Affects JPMorgan Chase, Capital One
Massive Epsilon breach affects JPMorgan Chase, Capital One, US Bank and others
Seven of the top Fortune 10 use Epsilon